1. vacuous. Empty,vacant,blank,void denote absence of content or contents. Empty means without appropriate or accustomed contents: an empty refrigerator.Vacant is usually applied to that which is temporarily unoccupied: a vacant chair; three vacant apartments.Blank applies to surfaces free from any marks or lacking appropriate markings, openings, etc.: blank paper; a blank wall.Void emphasizes completely unfilled space with vague, unspecified, or no boundaries: void and without form.6. delusive, vain. 12. unload, unburden.

empty

adj.

c.1200, from Old English æmettig "at leisure, not occupied, unmarried," from æmetta "leisure," from æ "not" + -metta, from motan "to have" (see might (n.)). The -p- is a euphonic insertion.

Sense evolution from "at leisure" to "empty" is paralleled in several languages, e.g. Modern Greek adeios "empty," originally "freedom from fear," from deios "fear." "The adj. adeios must have been applied first to persons who enjoyed freedom from duties, leisure, and so were unoccupied, whence it was extended to objects that were unoccupied" [Buck].

The adjective also yielded a verb (1520s), replacing Middle English empten, from Old English geæmtigian. Related: Emptied; emptying. Figurative sense of empty-nester first attested 1987. Empty-handed attested from 1610s.